


Everything's So Wrong (Interlude)

by lighthouseglow



Series: The Tales That Really Matter [2]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Anxiety Attacks, Flashbacks, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Insomnia, King Alistair, Long-Distance Relationship, Married Couple, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Queen Cousland, Separation Anxiety, Sibling Bonding, Social Anxiety, War, Warden Queen, Witch Hunt DLC
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-03
Updated: 2015-04-03
Packaged: 2018-03-21 01:28:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3672411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lighthouseglow/pseuds/lighthouseglow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Or he might swoop down on us and swooping, the histories of Ferelden say…” I said, mimicking the Grand Cleric’s pompous voice.</p><p>“…Is bad,” Alistair finished wryly.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Everything's So Wrong (Interlude)

**Author's Note:**

> The emotions driving this are really personal, but I'm just exploring Queen Lily's background since I didn't really have the courage to until I'd beaten the game.

I don’t like it when he’s not home—losing your family at a single stroke makes you paranoid—so I’ve drifted down to the castle library and am writing in my favorite armchair. The apothecary in Denerim was kind enough to give us a discount—we’re still trying to live like ordinary people, so I reduced the staff more than Fergus would like. Teryn Fergus, I’m sorry; Alistair gave my brother the title and a keep of his own the same day we were married.

“Lily…” Alistair pleaded with me softly that happy day, “…you sure you want us to marry in our armor?”

“Yes. No frivolities. I won’t waste good coin on a dress I will only wear once…and hate into the bargain.” I caught Alistair’s look of pain in the mirror as he stood with his arms around me, the safest place I’ve _ever_ been. “I’m sorry, you, I don’t mean to be a terse bitch today…”

“It’s _your_ day, you have every right.”

“At least this will be private. I’m sick of crowds, I’m sick of people, I just want to cuddle up next to you until the next age starts and never be called a hero again. I don’t want the fucking throne or any of—”

He grinned and talked into the back of my neck, making me shrivel and burn. “Well, we could fuck on the throne; it would save the housemaids one night’s laundering…”

“Shh, Daddy might be watching us up there.”

“And he will use Cousland discretion and turn away or vomit like Morrigan.”

“Or he might swoop down on us and swooping, the histories of Ferelden say…” I said, giggling and mimicking the Grand Cleric’s pompous voice.

“…Is bad,” Alistair finished wryly. “Speaking of, where’d Morrigan actually go?”

“She wanted to raise the…the…thing. Parasite. Whatever it was that got us in this room alive, right now.” I pushed a strand of brown hair behind my ear and began to braid my hair furiously.

“Lily, there’s a kinder term for that—children.” I love it when I make him laugh. I hate the memories because they surface when he’s not home at the castle and I have to be here with Fergus and Heathcliff, our dog. Alone with the echoing silence until I want to scream. _Outrun the dragon, you stupid bitch, if you can just not pass out you may be able to get some tea… The rocks, put the rocks in the catapult..._

…And then I wake up, easily startled as usual, in the library with a book in my lap. I have to…I have to focus on reality. This parchment is real, this stack of books Alistair recommended is within reach and I’m devouring all of them. Trying to. It’s a matter of pride. _My husband is apart from me, I defeated the dragon and I am carrying on. Damn right I’m carrying on. Look, I’m even reading the books we don’t agree on, like the book by Ser Wilfred from the Blessed Age about rabbit warrens. The warren is a fable about Ferelden, you see, and war and diplomatic relations and--_

“Sister?” Fergus asked. “Can you really not sleep again?” He was here in the library just now. “Let me ask one of the servants to brew you something.” He was in the usual position of taking charge, but I stopped him.

“Fergus…did Oriana ever do this? Sit up with Oren—” _Oren, bloody on the floor, and I’m going to…to… Oh, Maker, not my nephew! Not my nephew! An arrow in his…oh, my boy, my boy, he never would wish harm on anyone. Take Father, Maker, take Mother, take any adult but not this child!!! “Oren! Oren!” Leaning forward, feeling my blood freeze as I felt his crushed skull, felt…bone…_ Maker, I can’t go on writing about this; it hurts too much. “—And wait on you?” I was usually oblivious and asleep at the time, but that was before the blood and Arl Howe and falling for Alistair by accident and I was forced to grow up well beyond my twenty-three years.

“Lily, dear, don’t look so white… You frighten me,” he said, kneeling down next to me as I started to cry out of sheer terror. My vision melted into tears as I tried to look at Fergus, whose green eyes are exactly my own.

“I keep seeing him…just…on the floor…like a…” I said between sobs.

“Shh, all that’s past now… If you focus on it you’ll scare Alistair out of his mind when he returns!”

“I _want my king_!! It could happen to him just as easily, you know, just like Oren, just like Oren…”

“Lily, this Kirkwall mission is diplomatic; everyone loves Alistair. Maker, I know there’s a precedent for brothers being suspicious of their sisters’ husbands, but he’s like a brother to me.”

I laughed, coughed, tried to push the fear back. “He affectionately refers to _me_ as his old ball and chain.”

“Between you and me, I think he enjoys you holding him captive. He’s polite and attentive to the rest of us, but when you’re in the room he sort of…burns quietly. ‘Your sister is an amazing woman, Cousland, and I do not deserve her.’ I told him that by Andraste’s arse he did. It’s not much secret how he feels about you—sometimes he just doesn’t _shut up_ about you when you’re not there. Sometimes I invoke my rights as brother-in-law and _make_ him go wank… Apologies for the barracks coarseness, Your Majesty, but since I’m trying to cheer you up…”

“Unnecessary; you’re royally pardoned,” I laughed. “I’ve lived with you long enough that I’m used to it.”

“Has he ever broken faith with you, sister?”

“Absolutely not!” I flared up. “I just…get scared he will because of… It’s irrational, but with Daddy and Mother…”

“I understand. I never have stopped loving Oriana. Sometimes when I visit Highever I expect her to be there, waiting with open arms and a mug of mead for both of us…”

“That’s why I insisted we…work around the Grey Warden loophole. I can manage without him as long as he is somewhere walking on the earth, but without him _forever_ …”

“I know. Don’t torture yourself for loving him, Lily—at the end of the day love is all we have. You deserve happiness, too.”

“Thank you for the reminder, brother.”

“Tea?”

“Yes, I’d love some.” So I’ve settled in the library window seat, am looking at the sky from here and dreaming…

“Oh! Lily! If it makes you feel better, Kirkwall’s champion shares your name.”

“A Cousland relation?”

“No, unrelated. Her name is Lily Hawke and there’s a chance she might cross paths with the bastard who would be king,” he said wryly. “The reminder should send him flying back to you!”

“On the wings of a dragon?” I asked childishly. “That would be a dream come true! Especially if it breathed fire on the way!”

“Not a dream for your loyal subjects after the Blight. Now, let me go ask Cook about the tea…”

Oh, Alistair, love, come home, come home, come home… The dragon is optional.


End file.
